Penny has painted her door a crunchy apple green, and tied a vertical ribbon, running down from top to bottom, one with a Christmas motif. The result is her door looks like a huge Christmas present.

Pat-P has changed her color theme this year, from the all-pink of 2024 to red and crystal balls all over her house, but especially the living room, starting from the entrance and leading all the way to the dining room.

When he was a kid, my godchild Alex (not his real name) could not wait for December to plant the Christmas tree in their living room. It took some real diplomacy going back and forth between Alex and his parents before they could convince him to wait at least until July. Eventually, Alex gave in, obedient child that he was.

It was my friend S’ wish to have more than one tree in her apartment, so who could stop her? She had a trio of miniature trees on one end of her dining table and a similar arrangement in her bedroom, right beside her bed on the night table.

To each his own!

In my house, our tree – not quite a museum piece but all of six years old this year – lords it over the living room. It’s eight feet tall and, because it’s not a real tree, it has stopped shedding its needles. The tip of the tree is inches shy of the ceiling – what a delight to hang our collection of ornaments on it! They’re in clear crystal (plastic, actually), bamboo, silk and sateen, paper, felt. The cast includes the Three Kings riding a horse, an elephant, a camel; angels with and without their trumpets; and quirky people including a fat ballerina, a comedian with a funny face, and a Santa Claus whose snow-white beard covers 90 percent of his face.

What adds character – if I may use the word – besides its age is that the tree’s ornaments come from everywhere. Hong Kong, Tokyo, Paris, New York, Baguio, Divisoria – a short history of where we have been over the years as my children were growing up when it was December. Now they have their own children and one day soon I shall be listening to their own Christmas tree stories.